Page 45 of Accidental Fiancé

As soon as I walked into the gym, Dix read me. “What did you do wrong this time?”

“How the hell do you do that?”

He shrugged his massive shoulders. “It’s a gift. Wanna get changed and then we can talk about it?”

“I’d rather lift about it.”

“That’s the spirit. I’ll meet you here.”

After I changed and rejoined him on the floor, we warmed up with a run on the treadmills where I explained things. “…so really, it’s what’s best for everyone.”

“Julian Black. Brilliant billionaire yet total idiot when it comes to women.”

I hit the stop button on his machine and mine. “How’s that?”

“You gave her an out when she wanted an in.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Think about it from her point of view.”

“That’s all I’ve been doing, Dix. She doesn’t want me. She never has. I just made things easier for her.”

“I’m gonna make you give me twenty push-ups every time you say something dumb. As of now you owe me sixty.”

“You are out of your mind if you think?—"

He shook his head. “She doesn’t want you? She never has? You’re making things easier for her? That’s three right there. Three times twenty is sixty. Start now so you can get through them.”

He was not going to let up so I gave in. Screw it. Between reps I said, “She doesn’t. I tried in high school. I kissed her. She blew me off. I’ve never been on her radar, Dix. Not once. Making this into a business thing makes it easier for her when she leaves, so she doesn’t have to feel bad about leaving me and Piper behind.”

“This is my house. We don’t lie in my house, Julian.”

“I’m not lying!” I rolled onto my ass after number sixty.

He sat beside me and we stared at the ocean through the glass wall. “A man who says he’s not lying is either definitely lying, truly not lying, or lying to himself. Only one of those choices makes it a true statement, so there’s a two out of three chance that you’re lying, and half of that means you’re lying to yourself and you don’t even know it, which is just sad and unlike you. You’re more conscientious than that. So the most likely situation is that you’re lying, you know it, and you’re still going to do it because that’s what’s comfortable for you. Am I right?”

“That was too much math and philosophy for me all at once. I needed Maggie to get me through both of those classes back in the day, so…”

He slugged my shoulder. He had one hell of a punch, even when playing around. “Go make up with your girl.”

“She’s not my girl! None of this is real!”

Dix blew out a breath, a considerate expression on his face, while eighties punk rock played on the speakers. Our usualworkout music. “I’m a simple man, Julian. I like my steak rare. My wine red and full-bodied. I like to lift heavy. The steak, the wine, the weights, they’re as real as things get. Good steak and good wine, you can’t fake those. The weights weigh the same if you lift them here in California or in Timbuktu. That’s how I like things, and I’d consider myself somewhat of an expert on what’s the genuine article.”

“Your point?”

“You ran into your old crush. Found her in trouble and helped her out. Had a night of passion that turned into a morning of it, then proposed a cockamamie idea to her, which she willingly accepted. You had another passionate night with her, and now, you’re pulling back. Maybe you got scared, maybe you didn’t, but it’s pretty typical for guys to withdraw at the start of things.”

“So what?” I ran my fingers through my hair. “I swear to God if you don’t get to the point soon…”

“What I’m saying is, it might have been on an abbreviated timeline, but all of it sounds fucking real to me.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Falling in love is the simplest thing in the world, Julian. It’s people who make it complicated.”

I frowned so hard it hurt my face. “What?”

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